Switzerland: Secrecy Is Golden

The most valuable deposit in Switzerland's
bulging banks is secrecy, which the Swiss have shrewdly used
to lure shy money from all over the world. Any threat to this
hush-hush, confessional quality is therefore a blow at the very center
of the multibillion-dollar Swiss banking industry. By the same token, a
nation or group that sets out to track down the wealth of teetering
tyrants or the merely discreet rich frequently looks with frustration
to the Swiss banks, with their anonymous sanctuary and numbered
accounts. Last week secrecy and the desire for disclosure clashed in
the Swiss courts...